History of Animal Plagues. 159 



perceptibly increasing, proved highly obnoxious to the grain, 

 covering, as it did, the plants from the stalk to the ear with 

 spots like blood. This pestilence also attacked beans and all 

 other kinds of pulse ; so that in a few days were destroyed all 

 the preconceived hopes for the prosperity of the year. Never- 

 theless, the extreme fertility of the previous years had enabled 

 them to lay up some store for the future, and this lessened the 

 calamity. In the beginning of September, and vet more at the 

 exact time of the equinox, rain fell more copiously, and lasted 

 throughout the whole month of October, and as a consequence, 

 the banks of the rivers could with difficulty restrain the tremend- 

 ous power of the floods flowing between them. The two last 

 months were nearly rainless, and the year 1689 closed with 

 favourable weather. But in the beginning of the year 1660 

 (during which the pestilence of rust, by eating into the corn 

 and every other kind of crop, brought desperate fevers first to 

 those in the country, then to those in the town), the rain 

 returning, but more heavily and nearly continuously, clouded 

 the minds of all. Thus we passed a dreadful winter, with 



the spores nearly double the length of those of the otlier coni-nist, and not so 

 bright in colour. By intermediate forms these two rusts pass insensibly the one 

 into the other, so that it is sometimes difficult to distinguish them. Both have the 

 spores clustered together in the pustules, at first attached by their peduncles, but 

 they soon become free, and are scattered like rust powder over the plant.' 



There can be no doubt whatever, that plants infested by these minute fungi, 

 and used as food by animals, often cause diseases of a serious nature, and this 

 fact was well known to tlie old physicians. We have here the evidence of Ramaz- 

 zini, and others will be found in this history. Niemann declared that sheep would 

 not eat wheaten or oaten straw when it was covered with rust or Puccinia. — Gas- 

 parin, p. 236. 



M. Gohier gives many examples of epizootics which he believed were caused by 

 the rust of straw. — Sur Us effcts des Failles RouilUs. Lyons, 1804. 



Gerlach maintains that straw covered with Uredo linearis and Uredo riibigo- 

 vera is often the cause of anthrax. He also observes that horses employed to carry 

 away colewort were often attacked by ptyalism, and that this might be due to the 

 Stellaria media, which was very plentiful, and was always covered with Uredo 

 caryophyllacearum ; for he noticed this affection in sheep which had pastured on 

 the Stellaria media. The same author also testifies to anthrax being due to vetches 

 and clover infested by Credo leguminosarum, and that the Puccinia fisi ox 'pea 

 rust,' has been the cause of abortions in sheep, inversion of the uterus, and puur- 

 peral fever. — Mag. F. Thierheilh, vii. p. 216. 



Metaxa has witnessed the production of anthrax after the use of food contami- 

 nated by Uredo rtibigo. — Annali, ix. p. 68. Other veterinary authorities niigiu be 

 quoted in sujjport of the above assertion. 



